From the New York Times:
Chris Matthews, the veteran political anchor and voluble host of the long-running MSNBC talk show “Hardball,” resigned on Monday night, an abrupt departure from a television perch that made him a fixture of politics and the news media over the past quarter-century.
Mr. Matthews, 74, had faced mounting criticism in recent days over a spate of embarrassing on-air moments, including a comparison of Senator Bernie Sanders’s campaign to the Nazi invasion of France and an interview with Senator Elizabeth Warren in which the anchor was criticized for a condescending and disbelieving tone.
On Saturday, the journalist Laura Bassett wrote for GQ magazine online that Mr. Matthews had made inappropriate comments about her appearance in the makeup room of his studio on several occasions when she was a guest on his program.
On Monday, a solemn Mr. Matthews began his usual 7 p.m. broadcast by announcing to his viewers, “I’m retiring — this is the last ‘Hardball’ on MSNBC.”
(Featured image is “rgg_20090704_121659-2” by rgordon. Used under creative commons license.)
74, eh? He came across as much younger. I guess having access to good hair/makeup people is important.
Speech writer for Jimmy Carter and Chief of Staff for Tip O’Neill.
Huh.Report
Holy cow.
Report
I suspect there is a pretty ugly story behind this. That said, I’m happy to let him retire with dignity instead of hashing it out.
Pure speculation: there are one or more victims here who worked something out privately.Report
The NYT story itself gets into a number of (let’s call them) “incidents”.
I don’t know that I’d say that any one of them is sufficient to kick him off the show but all of them put together seem to indicate a crass, stupid, sexist, etc pattern of behavior… but if the situation is limited to stuff on the level of the stuff in the story, it seems to be the run-of-the-mill “old man doesn’t realize how long it’s been since 1978” that doesn’t quite rise to stuff we were willing to bust out the “well, you have to understand”s for Al Franken (who didn’t seem to understand that it wasn’t the 90’s).
That said, it has been a long, long time since the 90’s, let alone the 70’s.Report
His age surprised me. He graduated high school not long after Ringo Starr joined the Beatles and before the Rolling Stones released their first album, and he graduated college prior to the Tet Offensive.Report
Sometimes I think airline pilots have the right idea. You hit 65, you retire. Some people just have to hang on for way too long.Report